A woman born with a medical condition which has left her with one swollen arm says trolls tell her to just have it amputated, despite the limb being fully functional.
Olivia Klopchin was diagnosed with a vascular malformation when she was just two months old, an abnormal development of blood vessels, which can result in discolouration or protrusions in the affected area.
For Olivia, 18, this has led to her arm and hand swelling up, as well as slight skin discolouration. Although she has had a few stares from time to time, Olivia was shocked to see some of the online comments after sharing her story on TikTok.
A number of users told Olivia she should just get rid of the arm altogether, despite it being perfectly workable.
Determined Olivia has refused to let such remarks bring her down, stating, "Negativity on the internet has consumed so many people’s lives, but I choose not to let it consume mine."
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In a recent TikTok video, which has clocked up more than 2.4 million views and 240,000 likes, Olivia addressed the trolls head-on, posing with hands on her hips while lip-reading “Take it off? I would rather die."
One person wrote, “Personally I'd rather have a really nice prosthetic, and I could decorate it, but that's just me", while another said, "You’d look a lot better without it tho so.”
However, she's also received plenty of support, with a third person commenting: “People really would rather that you lose an entirely functional limb because they don’t find it aesthetically pleasing."
A fourth said: “Bruh regardless of your thoughts like imagine amputating an arm you use and works fine like???? really???” [sic]
Olivia, from Springfield, Vermont, US, said: “I didn’t start TikTok planning to make videos about my arm and have all these wonderful opportunities in life because of it, but that is something I have always wanted to do.
“I had never seen anyone with anything similar to me on the internet before and once I started to get these opportunities, I took them straight away because I wanted people like myself to be able to go on their phones and say ‘hey that person has what I have’ or ‘hey they look like me’.
“I’ve definitely had a lot of interesting reactions to my arm on the internet. Some people are so awesome about it and tell me how beautiful I am and how much they love my confidence.
“But then there are the negative people who try to tear me down and break my wall but there’s always going to be negative people on the internet – that’s something we can’t escape, whether we want to or not."
She continued: “Negativity on the internet has consumed so many people’s lives, but I choose not to let it consume mine. I question why would I let these people affect me when I’m already doing so good in life and when I’m already doing the things that I want to be doing. I can’t let somebody’s comment who I don’t even know bother me.
“I had never heard things like what people had said to me in a comment section in real life before, so when I first started TikTok it was a bit overwhelming but unfortunately you get used to it.”
Olivia has never even considered amputating her arm. However, she has experienced symptoms such as painful clotting, getting around three bad ones a year other as well as a couple of milder ones each month.
She added: “Other than pushing through the pain, I was able to do sports, I would hang out with friends, and my friends would question things about my arm but I was always open and willing to answer the questions they had.
“I am truly thankful that my arm hasn’t given me any downsides to life. I could consider the pain a downside but I choose not to. [By sharing on TikTok] it makes me so happy that I have been able to help so many people just from them hearing my story and for them being able to tell me theirs.”
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